


Many Ways of Dying

by JackOfNone



Category: Final Fantasy VI
Genre: Consent Issues, Dubious Consent, F/F, FF Kiss Battle, Mind Control, Non-Explicit, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-17
Updated: 2011-08-17
Packaged: 2017-10-22 17:32:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/240699
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JackOfNone/pseuds/JackOfNone
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Celes talks to Terra before her execution, or tries to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Many Ways of Dying

"I'm going to die," General Celes told the girl. She looked up at the sound of another human voice, but her eyes were uncomprehending.

Celes wasn't sure what the girl's name was. The only one who seemed to pay a great deal of attention to her was General Palazzo, and he never called her anything that Celes found worth repeating. She lived in a small room -- barely more than a cell -- and hardly ever came out of it unless she was needed to kill, like a sword in its sheath. Right now, she was sitting in the corner of the room with her knees drawn up to her chest against the cold. Celes kneeled down in front of her, and the girl watched her expectantly.

"I'm going to be arrested for refusing the Emperor's orders. It's likely I'll be executed, after the trial." The girl blinked. "If there is one." Of course, they were looking for her now. By all rights she should flee, but where could she possibly go? What else was there for her, now that she had forsaken her command? No, better to stay in the capital and face the Emperor she had betrayed. Better to face death unafraid, like a soldier, than to die a fugitive, worthless and without honor. That was all she had been raised to do -- fight, and kill, and ultimately die.

That was why she was here now, with this girl. If she was going to die soon, she wanted to spend the last few moments before the soldiers dragged her off with someone who neither knew or cared that she was a traitor. Another one whose only purpose was to fight, and kill, and die.

"I could try to take off the Slave Crown," Celes said. The girl cocked her head at her, and Celes continued apologetically. "It wouldn't help matters much, though. Kefka would just replace it, and I'm not sure what removing it would do to you."

She reached out, tentatively, and took the girl's hand. Her fingers wrapped reflexively around Celes' palm, and Celes moved to wrap her arms around the girl, who made a small noise of comfort and buried herself into Celes' embrace. She was cold, Celes realized, and pulled her closer.

Celes had never embraced anyone like this before. She had never had the need, or the desire, but she felt sorry for the poor girl, treated like a human cannon and practically kept in a cage. And anyway, the girl seemed to be responding. The Slave Crown was said to rob her of all conscious thought, but the scientists of the Empire had been wrong before.

"Girl," Celes murmured, stroking her hair, "would you..." She hardly knew what to say, how to ask for something so far outside of her experience. "Would you kiss me? Just once?"

The girl knew an order from a general when she heard one, and tipped her head up obediently to press her lips against Celes'. The girl kissed like she did everything else -- coldly, with the brutal efficiency of a machine performing its designated function.

Celes instantly regretted the kiss and tore herself away from the girl, a sick feeling beginning to coil in her stomach. The girl did not seem offended, or frightened, or much of anything else.

"I'm sorry," Celes said. "I shouldn't have come here." She stood up, brushing the dust from her knees. She was trembling, she realized. Not from fear -- disgust, perhaps at Kefka, but more at herself. The girl had curled up against the wall again. "If there's any mercy in the world, whoever finally kills General Palazzo will slay you too."

Clenching her hands to stop the shaking, Celes turned and left the girl alone, her face the same blank, unresponsive mask it had always been.


End file.
